2013/10/16

By Simon Denyer: China bypasses American 'New Silk Road' with two of its own!

BEIJING: Armed with tens of billions of dollars in investment deals and romantic tales of ancient explorer, Chinese President Xi Jinping has spent much of the past month promoting his vision of two new "Silk Roads" to connect his country to the West and secure its energy supplies, one by land and another by sea. In the process, he has eclipsed an American vision of a New Silk Road that was advanced with much fanfare by then-Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton two years ago and was supposed to revitalize Afghanistan as the link between Central and South Asia. The contrast between the two visions, one with huge sums of money on the table, the other struggling to get off the ground, only underlines how China's ever-growing clout in Asia is challenging the influence of the United States. In Central Asia in particular, China's leader has taken advantage of Russia's relative decline and the planned U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan to expand his country's influence, experts said. "China is making a pretty bold move," said Chris Johnson of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. "Xi Jinping sees a huge gaping hole in terms of trade and economic opportunities that the U.S. has so far failed to take advantage of." Dating back more than two millenia, a web of trade routes linking oasis towns brought Chinese silks and other products from across Asia to the West. In his call for a new Silk Road, Xi was underlining the importance of China securing its energy supplies overland to the gas and oil fields of Central Asia and beyond, and by sea through Asia's contested waters and via the busy Straight of Malacca. Last month, Xi traveled to Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzastan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan and signed tens of billions of dollars' worth of investment deals, taking a share in a major Kazakh oil field and expanding gas imports piped from Turmenistan. In Astana, Kazakhstan, where deals worth $30 billion were inked, he talked wistfully of almost hearing "the ring of camel bells echoing in the mountains" and seeing "the wisp of smoke rising from the desert." Xi spoke of the travels of Han dynasty envoy Zhang Qian to the region more than 2,100 years ago, but more substantively, he proposed the establishment of a Silk Road economic belt" to boost trade and transport links and strengthen regional policy coordination from the Pacific to the Baltic Sea. As well as the geostrategic energy play, Beijing sees economic benefits in moving goods from western China, which has lagged the booming east coast, through Central Asia. China's courting of the Central Asian republics has drawn comparisons to the Great Game, the 19th-century rivalry between Russia and Britain in the region. Viewed as a race, China is ahead, eclipsing Russia as the largest trading partner of four of the five Central Asian republics. Xi was the third consecutive Chinese president to visit the former Soviet Central Asia region countries that no U.S. president has visited. There are tremendous business opportunities in the area for U.S. companies in telecommunications, oil and roads. But at the moment, China is "coming out on top in the region," said Martha Brill Olcott of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. XI also has trained his sights farther east. Last week, he was in Malaysia and Indonesia, wrapping up tens of billions of dollars in business deals and promoting trade and military ties. He mentioned historical links, with tales of the Chinese navigator Zheng He, who made seven visits to "the Western Seas in the 15th century. Xi also spoke of building a "maritime Silk Road."